Moroccan Women and Colonial Encounters in Leonora Peets’ Women of Marrakech

Abstract

Since narratives about colonial Morocco historicize turning points marked by shifting patterns of intercultural encounters, political developments, and local experiences of Moroccan women caught under the grip of colonialism and modernity, Women of Marrakech (1988) by Leonora Peets is a contribution to this literature that describes a period when Moroccans’ identities, particularly women's, have been shaped by colonialism and its subsequent encountering with the European other. Seen as a manifestation of the global modernity process, colonialism altered the material and epistemological circumstances of Morocco and other nations around the world. In that regard, the present paper contends that the encounter between Moroccan women and Europeans has contributed to the formation of Moroccan women's consciousness. Drawing upon Mary Pratt’s concept of “contact zones” (1992), the paper concludes arguing that the presence of Europeans in Marrakech has gradually influenced the attitudes of Peets’ women about themselves, their husbands and families, and their overall sense of Moroccanness.